i can ease your pain get you on your feet again
by patientalien
Summary: Tony Stark knows from self-destruction, but he'd underestimated Thor's capacity for it. How are they supposed to complete a time heist when their god of thunder is going through a five-year-long mental breakdown? SPOILERS FOR ENDGAME


Tony Stark knows that the past five years have been kinder to him than it has been to many others, but the truth of that doesn't really hit him until he sees Thor again. He knows there had been a question of whether the God of Thunder would even come - apparently Bruce had heard some things from somebody named Valkyrie about how Thor was faring in New Asgard, but Bruce and Build-a-Bear had returned with a much-changed Odinson in tow.

The first time Tony sees him, all he can think of to say is, "Well, isn't that just a cryin' shame." Thor doesn't seem to pick up on it, but Thor also doesn't seem super aware of his surroundings, either. In fact, he's all but dangling off Bruce's arm, tangled hair and beard obscuring most of his face.

"Sorry," Bruce says with a wince, gesturing with his free hand to the god draped over him. "He took the promise of beer pretty seriously." As if on cue, Thor belches and Tony has to take a step sideways to get upwind of it. He uses the change in position to bring himself up on Thor's other side, leveraging himself under the massive arm to take some of the weight off Bruce. Not that Brucie-boy couldn't handle it, it's just that… Well, now Tony knows for certain that he's made the right choice, coming here, doing this.

The raccoon stays behind, powering down the jet, while Bruce and Tony work to get Thor inside the Complex. Tony makes a mental note to gently remind the guy where the showers are. As soon as they make it to one of the communal areas, they deposit Thor onto a chair. Tony's pretty sure a couple of vertabrae might be out of alignment from that little adventure. "It's bad, Tone," Bruce murmurs, taking him by the arm to lead him away from Thor - who Tony still isn't sure is conscious or not. "It's really bad. He can't even hear Thanos' _name_ without freaking out. I…" Bruce glances over his shoulder and Tony crosses his arms over his chest, raising a hand to rub at his jaw. "I really don't know if he's up to this," Bruce says.

"We need him," Tony says firmly, but he's afraid Bruce might be right. They might need to come up with a work-around, if it turns out Thor really can't handle what they're about to do. Because the last thing Tony wants to do is make things worse for anyone. That's not the point. The _point_ is to fix everything, except… Tony is brought up short as he realizes that their plan _doesn't_ fix everything, not for Thor. Even if they succeed, even if they manage to pull off the impossible, Thor's family, his home, and a large proportion of his people, will still be gone. And there's nothing they can do about it. "Okay," he breathes out, "team meeting."

Bruce glances over Tony's shoulder at Thor, who has slumped down further in the chair and is now snoring loudly. "It we're gonna have a meeting, we should do it here," he murmurs, "I don't want to leave him alone for long."

Tony winces, trying not to think of what Bruce is _actually _saying, and what the implications of that might be, not only for their mission but for Thor himself. "You think he's really gonna -" Tony finds the words choke him and he cuts himself off. "Yeah, alright, agreed, get Rogers and Romanov in here, then. I doubt Sleeping Beauty will notice anyway."

Bruce nods and heads off to round up the troops as Tony walks back over to the sleeping god. The differences between the Thor in front of him and the Thor who had left the compound five years ago are profound, but honestly, Tony had been too caught up in his own head, his own trauma, at the time to really notice how Thor had been doing - _really _doing - when he'd left. All Tony knows is that while he had been living a charmed life with Pepper and Morgan, Thor had been slowly crumbling, alone. And Tony knows how that feels.

Bruce returns quickly with Steve and Nat following close behind, and Tony turns around, blocking most of their view of Thor. "Ah. Great," he says, clapping his hands together. "Glad you could make it to the first meeting of the we-need-a-backup-plan players."

"Tony, there is no backup plan," Steve insists. "This is our shot."

Tony bites back a sharp response. No, he's over picking fights with Steve Rogers. "Yeah, but we're gonna blow our shot if we don't…" He shakes his head and steps out of the way to reveal Thor.

"Holy shit," Nat blurts, then claps a hand over her mouth, letting out a muffled, "_Thor?" _Her gaze rises to meet Bruce's. "What happened?" she asks.

Bruce spreads his massive hands. "He never wanted to talk to me when I called, so I only know what I saw and what Valkyrie told me. He just - can't do it anymore, guys. He's a mess. Look at him!" It's true that Tony would expect this Thor to be more interested in lifting a sandwich than a hammer, but Tony also knows not to judge on appearances. No, he's judging on… everything else. "I said Thanos' name and he just. He shut down. He didn't want to come, at all, we had to bribe him with alcohol which, as you can see, uh. Backfired. A little."

"Didn't backfire if it got him here, Bruce," Tony replies softly, not even having the heart to find a quip for the occasion. "If he cant help us, maybe at least we can help him." They won't be able to bring back anything or anyone Thor has lost, but they can at least remind him that he isn't completely alone.

"Wait, what do you mean, if he cant help us?" Nat asks, jaw clenched. Tony knows full well that she already knows the answer to the question, but needs to talk it out, to get as much information as she can. She's well on her way to becoming a new Nick Fury, he can't help but think.

Steve drops to a crouch beside Thor and probes the god's wrist to get a pulse. "He was traumatized," he explains, voice low, eyes on his wristwatch. "We all were, really. But Thor - man, I tried to talk to him before he left, but there was… He's always bounced back from stuff, you know? When he didn't seem interested, I figured… you know, maybe he really did just need some time." He drops Thor's hand back onto the arm of the chair and stands. "He should probably get seen by medical."

Bruce shakes his head. "I did an exam on the quint," he says. "There's the obvious weight… thing…" Because if Thor was a brick shithouse before, now he's, well… considerably less well-constructed. Tony thinks if he squints he can make out what's left of Thor's impressive musculature under the swell of his belly and the meatiness of his arms, but that might just be wishful thinking. "He's still pretty malnourished, though. I'm guessing he's getting the bulk of his calories from booze these days. Which is another thing… a, uh, a Catch-22."

Tony realizes immediately what Bruce is talking about. "We can't ask him to sober up for this," he says.

Steve looks at him with narrowed eyes. "Tony, we _need _him to be sober for this." But Steve isn't stupid, and doesn't he like run a support group now? So he should know where this is going.

"We _can't," _Bruce doubles down. "Partly because I think at this point telling him that is a good guarantee of him taking off, but also because we don't really have the luxury of waiting for him to dry out. That could take months, guys. Years, maybe, especially if we're forcing him to do it in order to face down the thing that was causing him to drink like this in the first place. No, it's… this is - this is what we've got to work with."

They're all silent for a moment, contemplative. "So what do we do?" Nat asks, not looking at any of them.

"We protect him," Tony says decisively. "We need him, but we won't count on him for any of the heavy lifting." They can't risk this whole thing, Tony knows that. He knows he can't let anything - _anything - _get in the way of what they're doing, but unless Thor manages to pull it together once he wakes up - and from personal experience, Tony doubts that very much - they have to work out the alternative.

Bruce shakes his head. "He won't like that," he says. "I mean. He's still _Thor_. He's going to hate being sidelined. But - I'm a little afraid that he's gonna do something… really stupid."

"Then we stay with him," Steve announces, oh so optimistic, so certain. "In shifts if we have to. Get the others to help. We're still a team, and we still take care of our own." It's the perfect Captain America-brand pep talk, and Tony tries really hard not to grind his teeth and instead be grateful they're getting a second chance to try being a team again.

Nodding, Bruce maneuvers himself to Thor's side, crouching on the other side of Steve to check the God of thunder's respiration. "Don't say Thanos' name around him," he whispers as if Thor will hear him in his stupor. "And I would stay away from bringing up New Asgard or anything like that. Just. Stick to the basics right now."

"How's the weather?" Nat snorts, arms crossed over her chest. "He's not an idiot, we can't walk on eggshells around him." Thor's pride has always been something they, in happier times, had poked fun at. Now it hardly seems funny at all.

Bruce shakes his head again. "Wait until he wakes up," he suggests as he stands. "You'll see what I mean."

Tony can't help the pit of dread that opens up in his gut. "Yeah, cool, okay, let's rally the troops, then. Banner, you want to explain what's going on to everyone? I'll keep Thunder Thighs company 'till he wakes up." Because nobody else knows self destruction quite like Tony Stark, and he wants to make sure Thor knows at least _someone _here understands, and isn't going to push too hard. No, Tony doesn't want to make things worse. He just wants to fix as much as he can.

Wakefulness returns slowly and painfully. He's in a chair instead of a bed, which isn't particularly unusual. He's hungover - still a little drunk, actually - but that's simply a fact of life nowadays. He's used to it. What he's not used to is how the light is filtering into this room, and how it smells so much _cleaner_ than the tatty blankets Korg throws over him. Thor Odinson blinks bleary eyes until the world comes into focus again, and for a brief, terrible moment, he thinks he's gone back in time.

He immediately recognizes the common room of the residential section of Avengers Compound, and the man sitting in a chair across from him, fiddling with some kind of small electronic device. What is he _doing_ here? Sitting up a little straighter, trying to decide if this is a dream or reality - and if it's reality, then the _why_ behind it - because he shouldn't be here. He can't be here. He's not an Avenger anymore, how could he be, with what he had - he had - gone. All of them, gone. Still gone. Because of him. His chest tightens and he raises a hand to pull at the front of his shirt, struggling to get air. In a split-second, the man in the chair is on his knees next to Thor. "Hey, hey, it's okay," Tony Stark says, pressing a hand against Thor's chest tightly, the pressure giving him something to focus on besides the crushing pain in his lungs.

"Stark," he gasps, feeling his remaining eye burn with humiliated tears. Of everyone on the team, having Stark see this feels like the worst possible option. What is he _doing_ here? He focuses on regaining control of his breathing for a moment, already wracking his memory for where they'd kept the good liquor, because that - that's what he needs. Just to calm down enough to figure this all out, to make sure everyone knows that the Mighty Thor is perfectly, _perfectly_ fine, thank you very much. He's _fine._

_I'm fine._

_I'm fine._

He rises to his feet as his brain helpfully informs him that there used to be bottles of whiskey in the cabinet under the bookshelf right across the room from him. Perfect. "Uh," Stark vocalizes when Thor pushes past him, his focus currently on slowing the clamoring thoughts threatening to send him back into a panic attack. "Hey, Thor, buddy, sit back down for a sec. I wanna talk to you."

"Just a second," Thor replies dismissively. He is certainly not going to _talk_ to anyone until he's had a drink. It takes using the backs of the chairs and countertops to maintain a steady course, but he eventually makes it, pulling out a nearly-full bottle with a triumphant, "HA!" Tearing it open, not caring if Stark thinks it desperation - it's not, it isn't, it's just what he needs to figure out what's happening, Thor swallows down a good half of the bottle before dropping it back onto the cabinet top with a thud. Already he can feel the familiar, comforting warmth curling in his belly, his racing mind beginning to slow. Better. Much better. "Okay," he says, turning his attention back to Stark but keeping his hand on the bottle. "So what's all this about, then? Last thing I remember is the cable guys not wanting to fix the -" Wait, no, it hadn't been the cable guys, had it? It had been Bruce- but he'd looked weird. Looked like Hulk but sounded like Bruce. Thor hadn't questioned it at the time. Bruce and Rabbit, yeah, that was right.

"Fix the…" Stark prompts and Thor realizes that he's lost time thinking again. Well, that isn't going to help him prove how _fine_ and _okay_ he is,

"Fix the cable," Thor completes his thought. "S'no good service out there, you know. Gotta really…" He raises the bottle to his lips again and lowers it only when his eyes start to water. Swiping a hand across his mouth, feeling the damp of the whiskey that has spilled onto his beard, he finds himself stumbling backwards against the wall as the room tilts and the edges of his vision start to blacken.

He hears Stark make some kind of exclamation, and then feels hands on his shoulder and back. "Geddoff!" he protests, pushing himself along the wall and away from his assailant, squaring his shoulders and trying to make himself look as regal as absolutely possible. "I am - I don't need help. S'fine." It's fine. It's fine. It's fine. It's fine.

"Mmhmm, whatever you say there, Leaving Las Vegas," comes Stark's voice, cutting through the hazy veil that has descended over Thor's awareness. "Come on, let's get you a little less upright. I only clean up puke if it belongs to my kid." Kid? What kid? Who had a kid? Oh, wait, hadn't Valkyrie mentioned that Bruce had mentioned that Stark had a kid? When had that been? A month ago? No, that didn't feel right. A year? Two? When _was that?_

"When - when did you have a child?" he asks, rallying himself, pushing back against oblivion just hard enough to be able to speak. More or less.

Stark's hands guide him back to the chair he'd woken up on. He thinks it's the same chair. All the chairs look the same in here, they always had. Stark is speaking, but Thor is thinking because on Asgard, the furnishings were all unique, all custom commissioned for the royal family. His favorite chair had been in Frigga's study, but it had also been Loki's favorite chair and Frigga always made extra time for Loki, so Thor didn't get to sit in it very often. Frigga always made extra time for Loki, and still - and still - and still - Thor's thoughts stutter to a halt at the memory of his brother, curled in their mother's cozy chair, reading some book or another that he would invariably use to cause mischief later. The chair is gone. The study is gone. Frigga is gone. Loki is gone. They're gone, and they're never, ever, ever coming back. He bites back a sob and wishes Stark hadn't left the whiskey all the way across the room. Loki could have just made it teleport over here.

"What was that?" Stark asks, and Thor realizes suddenly that he must have spoken out loud. He doesn't remember what he said so instead lowers his head to rest in his hand. "Thor. Come on, bud, work with me here." Stark doesn't sound angry with him, Thor thinks. Not like Valkyrie, who comes over to yell at him in what is really his only way of separating one endless empty day from another. No, Stark sounds something else but Thor doesn't know what that something else is. "Thor?" Oh, he should say something. He should really say something.

"Present," he manages, and then giggles, because he is a lot of things, but _present_ is not one of them at the moment.

"Barely." Stark seems to agree with him, at least, and that thought makes Thor laugh even harder, because when did he ever _truly_ care what his mortal friends thought of him? Sure, he wanted to be liked and wanted to be useful - oh, and he _used_ to be useful. He did, he swears. He wasn't always like this, cross his heart and hope - really really really hope - to die. Stick some poison in his brother's eye, like the serpent that one time after everyone thought Loki had killed Baldur. He hadn't, and Thor had _known_ he hadn't, and he had still let - Wait. Wait. Wait. This is not what _okay_ sounds like.

He blinks at Stark, barely able to make out more than a dark blur at this point. It doesn't matter. None of this does, and none of it ever will. "Thor, Thor, if you don't say something that isn't gibberish in the next ten seconds, I swear -"

One. Two. Three. Four. Five. Six. Seven. Eight. Nine. Ten. "I. Am Fine," he enunciates carefully. And then he leans forward and vomits before welcome darkness swallows him.

If anything, Bruce may have understated how badly Thor was doing, Tony thinks as he jumps backwards with a yelp to avoid the splash of liquid that Thor somehow manages not to get entirely down his beard. Not that _that_ matters when the god goes absolutely limp. Fuck. Shit, fuck. That wasn't a 'fell asleep' motion. That was a 'passed the fuck out halfway through a thought' motion. Tony is well aware of the difference, and one requires medical attention. "FRIDAY, tell Big Green he needs to get back here right now." Luckily, Thor hadn't pitched out of the chair, and his head is already lolling forward so Tony doesn't have to worry about aspiration or anything like that. Thor's taking huge, gasping breaths and that doesn't seem like a particularly good sign, though. He's relieved as hell when Bruce shows up less than a minute later, and even more relieved when Bruce is alone. This isn't something the whole team needs to witness.

"Shit, Tony, what did you do?" Bruce exclaims, taking in the scene.

Oh, sure, blame the genius. "Didn't take into account what a bottle of whiskey in less than five minutes would do to an Asgardian," he answers, feeling a little chagrined. He knows they can't force Thor to quit drinking for this, but - "Man, you weren't kidding. He really isn't up for this, is he?" That puts a definite crimp in things. It would be easier to just tell Thor to man up, to get over his grief, to pull himself out of the bottle long enough to do what needs to be done. It would be easy, but it would get them nowhere. And it wouldn't be fair.

"He's going to medical," Bruce announces, his cursory exam over. With almost no effort at all, Bruce lifts Thor into his arms. The god nestles against the massive green chest, looking positively small despite his own great size. It's… weird, and more than a little unsettling. "If we make him do this, Tone…"

If they make him do this, Thor might very well end up killing himself before anything can be fixed at all. But they can't do it without him. "We won't make him," Tony says. "But he gets the choice. We still have plenty of work to do on the calibrations, stuff. He can see what we're doing, be part of the planning." When Tony had been at his worst, something even just having the _option_ of feeling useful had helped, even if he hadn't taken the option at the time.

Once in medical, Bruce settles Thor onto a bed that groans under the weight. Tony winces. "I'll go talk to them, get things set up in here. You should probably let the rest of the team know what's going on." A valid suggestion, all things considered, but Tony's tempted to tell him to stick that suggestion up his ass. He _still_ hasn't gotten a conversation with Thor, and he's definitely not going to just let it go. Still, it's not like Thor is capable of holding a conversation right now anyway, so he may as well fill everybody in on their resident Thunderer.

He leaves Bruce to his task, and heads back to what seems to have become Natasha's office. She clearly fancies herself the new leader of the Avengers and, you know what? Tony's really okay with that. He always had liked her. "What happened?" asks Barton, not looking up from where he's messing around with that sword he's suddenly carrying around.

"Okay, here's the deal, huddle up guys," Tony says, clapping his hands together. "We're doing some business as usual stuff. We still have test runs to go, things to prepare. And we've got to keep doing that. We've got to." They can't just stop this whole thing in its tracks, much as Tony would love to be able to give Thor all the time he needs. "Thor is probably gonna be a no-go." Tony watches the varying expressions of dismay on his friends' faces and knows his own is mirroring them. "But, we're gonna include him as much as we can in the planning stages. Let him see what we're gonna accomplish. If he wants to help, great. If he doesn't, or he can't, that's fine too. We'll work around it."

"Are you sure we can't just - ?" Steve starts to ask, but Tony cuts him off.

"I'm sure we can't just," he confirms. "It's not gonna happen. Bruce was seriously downplaying things." Tony is sure Thor wasn't consciously attempting suicide in chugging down that bottle- deaf to Tony's protests - but it's obvious Thor has exactly zero regard for his own well-being. And that's a huge risk for all of them. "We're gonna fix the Snap, and we're gonna help our friend. That's it. That's what we're doing."

There's nothing else they _can_ do. "Alright." Steve's nod of agreement is all that's needed for the rest of them to sign on as well. "I'm in." And, of course, so is everybody else - even the ones who had never even met Thor. Yeah, these are good people, Tony thinks. A good team. And if anyone can pull off the impossible one more time, it's the Avengers.

As they go their separate ways for the time being, off to pursue the tasks they were completing before Thor's arrival, Tony goes back down to medical. "How's he doing?" Tony asks Bruce, who is standing next to Thor's bed, trying to get an IV in with his thick, green fingers. "Here, let me help," he offers, taking Bruce's place and deftly inserting the IV into the back of Thor's hand. Tony notices the nails have been bitten down to the quick, and the right thumbnail is bloody around the cuticles. Anxiety, Tony realizes with only the mildest shiver.

"Fluids and some nutrients and electrolytes will help a lot," Bruce says, glancing at the readouts surrounding the bed. "His reserves are just depleted. I get the feeling this is more to deal with than he's used to, on top of it.. Did you know he plays video games now?" Tony snorts in surprise; Thor had once implored him to _send a raven_ instead of learning how to use a cell phone. "Yeah, on the internet and everything. It was wild."

Hmm, well, that's something, at least. "I talked to the team, and they're on board,' he informs Bruce, who smiles with teeth. Tony smiles back. "I'm glad you got him to come back," he says. Together, that's what Steve had said. We win together. And even if Thor won't be fighting beside them (not that Tony actually anticipates any _fighting_, exactly, it's a figure of speech, give him a break), they'll still have his back. Because Tony Stark does not fail twice, and this time, he's going to bring them all home, and Thor will need them, after. When everyone else is reuniting with their loved ones, Thor will still be grieving. But he won't be alone, this time. And, well, that's something.


End file.
